In China, pre-orders of Tesla model number three are now available cheaper. This event occurred when the company decided to combat the import tariffs by selling their vehicles at 13% lower prices for Chinese consumers. The cars from domestic factories are cheaper than the models imported from the United States, and the Tesla company pointed out that they expect to commence with the deliveries within the next ten months.
In January, a factory was opened in Shanghai, and Elon Musk attended the groundbreaking event. This facility is China’s first wholly foreign-owned car factory and will help the Tesla company in minimizing the impact of trade battles like Beijing imposing a high tariff on US cars being imported. Gigafactory 3 came as a result of overcoming disputes between the two biggest economies — China and the US. The Chinese Tesla factory is the biggest yet and the first one outside the United States. By entering the world’s leading car market, the company hopes to turn its fortune around. In an effort to help the industry development, Beijing claims it would terminate restrictions on foreign electric car producers.
Back in January, Tesla announced its plans for a thousand job cuts since it was the most challenging period in the electric vehicles’ history. Elon Musk, the Chief Executive, said that the job cuts were a necessity for improving profit and helping the production of the new Tesla model 3. More than 4,000 jobs were lost in the second round of cuts. Also, the company struggled to reach production norms due to some quality control issues. The final headcount of the reduced full-time workforce was at 7%, and there was no other choice, the company claims.
The Tesla company and its vehicles drew a lot of attention a few months ago; namely, a video on social networks appeared to show one of its models exploding in Shanghai. They immediately started to investigate the matter, and to this day, there was not a single report on the case. In the video, the Tesla Model S began to smoke and then burst into flames. The surrounding vehicles suffered some serious damage. However, the real cause of the explosion is not clear yet, and the video’s authenticity has not been verified.